University of British Columbia
Department of Philosophy
PhD, 2015
CV
Tempe, Arizona, United States
Areas of Interest
Sustainability
Well-Being
  •  34
    [Newspaper opinion] If you’re like most people, you’ve been taught that climate action is a sacrifice. Cutting emissions from fossil fuels, you’ve probably been told, is the economy-squeezing price we must pay for a livable planet. But our research explains why we should look at this issue through a different frame. Frames help us think about complex issues. They suggest starting assumptions, problems to be solved and point towards possible solutions. Sacrifice frames begin with the assumption …Read more
  •  4
    Introduction to the INEM 2021 conference special issue
    Journal of Economic Methodology 30 (4): 273-275. 2023.
    The International Network for Economic Method (INEM), in collaboration with College of Global Futures, Arizona State University (ASU), was honored to host the 15th Biennial Conference in Tempe, Ari...
  •  186
    Collapse, Social Tipping Dynamics, and Framing Climate Change
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics. forthcoming.
    In this article, we claim that recent developments in climate science and renewable energy should prompt a reframing of debates surrounding climate change mitigation. Taken together, we argue that these developments suggest (1) global climate collapse in this century is a non-negligible risk, (2) mitigation offers substantial benefits to current generations, and (3) mitigation by some can generate social tipping dynamics that could ultimately make renewables cheaper than fossil fuels. We explain…Read more
  •  695
    The Concept of Sustainability
    In Byron Williston (ed.), Environmental Ethics for Canadians (3rd Edition), Oxford University Press. pp. 385-390. 2023.
    American philosopher Wilfrid Sellars (1962) once said that “the aim of philosophy, abstractly formulated, is to understand how things in the broadest possible sense hang together in the broadest possible sense.” My main question is this: within the context of contemporary sustainability science, how does the concept of ‘sustainability’ in the broadest possible sense of the concept hang together in the broadest possible sense? I will answer this question by advancing two new explicative definiti…Read more
  •  525
    When is Green Nudging Ethically Permissible?
    with Daniel Fischer, Julia Silver, Philip Arthur, Rebecca Livernois, Timara Crichlow, Gil Hersch, Michiru Nagatsu, and Joshua K. Abbott
    Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability 60 (n/a): 101236. 2023.
    This review article provides a new perspective on the ethics of green nudging. We advance a new model for assessing the ethical permissibility of green nudges (GNs). On this model, which provides normative guidance for policymakers, a GN is ethically permissible when the intervention is (1) efficacious, (2) cost-effective, and (3) the advantages of the GN (i.e. reducing the environmental harm) are not outweighed by countervailing costs/harms (i.e. for nudgees). While traditional ethical objectio…Read more
  •  42
    Climate change and the threat to civilization
    Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 42 (119). 2022.
    Despite recognizing many adverse impacts, the climate science literature has had little to say about the conditions under which climate change might threaten civilization. Discussions of the mechanisms whereby climate change might cause the collapse of current civilizations has mostly been the province of journalists, philosophers, and novelists. We propose that this situation should change. In this opinion piece, we call for treating the mechanisms and uncertainties associated with climate coll…Read more
  •  36
    Modeling the precautionary principle with lexical utilities
    Synthese 199 (3-4): 8701-8740. 2021.
    Confronted with the possibility of severe environmental harms, such as catastrophic climate change, some researchers have suggested that we should abandon the principle at the heart of standard decision theory—the injunction to maximize expected utility—and embrace a different one: the Precautionary Principle. Arguably, the most sophisticated philosophical treatment of the Precautionary Principle is due to Steel. Steel interprets PP as a qualitative decision rule and appears to conclude that a q…Read more
  •  514
    Sustainable Consumption Communication: A Review of an Emerging Field of Research
    with Daniel Fischer, Julia-Lena Reinermann, Georgina Guillen Mandujano, Sonali Diddi, and Philip J. Vergragt
    Journal of Cleaner Production 1 (300): 126880. 2021.
    Communication plays an important role in promoting sustainable consumption. Yet how the academic literature conceptualizes and relates communication and sustainable consumption remains poorly understood, despite growing research on communication in the context of sustainable consumption. This article presents the first comprehensive review of sustainable consumption communication (SCC) research as a young and evolving field of scholarly work. Through a systematic review and narrative synthesis o…Read more
  •  428
    1. A multidisciplinary group of scholars within the International Commission on Stratigraphy – known as the Anthropocene Working Group – recently recommended the Anthropocene as a new geological ep...
  •  239
    Energy Decisions within an Applied Ethics Framework: An Analysis of Five Recent Controversies
    with Jacob Bethem, Giovanni Frigo, Saurabh Biswas, and Martin Pasqualetti
    Energy, Sustainability and Society 10 (10): 29. 2020.
    Everywhere in the world, and in every period of human history, it has been common for energy decisions to be made in an ethically haphazard manner. With growing population pressure and increasing demand for energy, this approach is no longer viable. We believe that decision makers must include ethical considerations in energy decisions more routinely and systematically. To this end, we propose an applied ethics framework that accommodates principles from three classical ethical theories—virtue e…Read more
  •  200
    From TVs to Tablets: The Relation between Device-Specific Screen Time and Health-Related Behaviors and Characteristics
    with Maricarmen Vizcaino, Matthew Buman, and Christopher Wharton
    BMC Public Health 20 (20): 1295. 2020.
    Background The purpose of this study was to examine whether extended use of a variety of screen-based devices, in addition to television, was associated with poor dietary habits and other health-related characteristics and behaviors among US adults. The recent phenomenon of binge-watching was also explored. Methods A survey to assess screen time across multiple devices, dietary habits, sleep duration and quality, perceived stress, self-rated health, physical activity, and body mass index, was ad…Read more
  •  643
    On the Concept and Conservation of Critical Natural Capital
    International Studies in the Philosophy of Science (N/A): 1-22. 2020.
    Ecological economics is an interdisciplinary science that is primarily concerned with developing interventions to achieve sustainable ecological and economic systems. While ecological economists have, over the last few decades, made various empirical, theoretical, and conceptual advancements, there is one concept in particular that remains subject to confusion: critical natural capital. While critical natural capital denotes parts of the environment that are essential for the continued existence…Read more
  •  548
    The World as a Garden: A Philosophical Analysis of Natural Capital in Economics
    Dissertation, University of British Columbia. 2015.
    This dissertation undertakes a philosophical analysis of “natural capital” and argues that this concept has prompted economists to view Nature in a radically novel manner. Formerly, economists referred to Nature and natural products as a collection of inert materials to be drawn upon in isolation and then rearranged by human agents to produce commodities. More recently, nature is depicted as a collection of active, modifiable, and economically valuable processes, often construed as ecosystems th…Read more
  •  619
    Sustainability science seeks to extend scientific investigation into domains characterized by a distinct problem-solving agenda, physical and social complexity, and complex moral and ethical landscapes. In this endeavor it arguably pushes scientific investigation beyond its usual comfort zones, raising fundamental issues about how best to structure such investigation. Philosophers of science have long scrutinized the structure of science and scientific practices, and the conditions under which t…Read more
  •  617
    Given the endowment effect, the role of attention in decision-making, and the framing effect, most behavioral economists agree that it would be a mistake to accept the satisfaction of revealed preferences as the normative criterion of choice. Some have suggested that what makes agents better off is not the satisfaction of revealed preferences, but ‘true’ preferences, which may not always be observed through choice. While such preferences may appear to be an improvement over revealed preferences,…Read more
  •  330
    The Preservation Paradox and Natural Capital
    Ecosystem Services: Science, Policy and Practice 101058 (N/A): 1-7. 2020.
    Many ecological economists have argued that some natural capital should be preserved for posterity. Yet, among environmental philosophers, the preservation paradox entails that preserving parts of nature, including those denoted by natural capital, is impossible. The paradox claims that nature is a realm of phenomena independent of intentional human agency, that preserving and restoring nature require intentional human agency, and, therefore, no one can preserve or restore nature (without making…Read more
  •  705
    Reliability of a New Measure to Assess Screen Time in Adults
    with Maricarmen Vizcaino, Matthew Buman, and Christopher Wharton
    BMC Public Health 19 (19): 1-8. 2019.
    Background: Screen time among adults represents a continuing and growing problem in relation to health behaviors and health outcomes. However, no instrument currently exists in the literature that quantifies the use of modern screen-based devices. The primary purpose of this study was to develop and assess the reliability of a new screen time questionnaire, an instrument designed to quantify use of multiple popular screen-based devices among the US population. Methods: An 18-item screen-time qu…Read more
  •  394
    Situating Environmental Philosophy in Canada
    In C. Tyler DesRoches, Frank Jankunis & Byron Williston (eds.), Canadian Environmental Philosophy, Mcgill-queen's University Press. 2019.
    The volume includes topics from political philosophy and normative ethics on the one hand to philosophy of science and the philosophical underpinnings of water management policy on the other. It contains reflections on ecological nationalism, the legacy of Grey Owl, the meaning of ‘outside’ to Canadians, the paradigm shift from mechanism to ecology in our understanding of nature, the meaning of the concept of the Anthropocene, the importance of humans self-identifying as ‘earthlings’, the challe…Read more
  •  296
    Since Thomas Kuhn’s The Structure of Scientific Revolutions (1962), historians and philosophers of science have paid increasing attention to the implications of disciplinarity. In this chapter we consider restrictions posed to interdisciplinary exchange between ecology and economics that result from a particular kind of commitment to the ideal of disciplinary purity, that is, that each discipline is defined by an appropriate, unique set of objects, methods, theories, and aims. We argue that, whe…Read more
  •  251
    Linking Forests and Economic Well-Being: A Four-Quadrant Approach
    with Sen Wang, Lili Sun, Brad Stennes, Bill Wilson, and G. Cornelis van Kooten
    Canadian Journal of Forest Research 1 (37): 1821-1831. 2007.
  •  291
    The concept of natural capital denotes a rich variety of natural processes, such as ecosystems, that produce economically valuable goods and services. The Anthropocene signals a diminished state of nature, however, with some scholars claiming that no part of the Earth’s surface remains untouched. What are ecological economists to make of natural capital during the Anthropocene? Is natural capital still a coherent concept? What is the conceptual relationship between nature and natural capital? Th…Read more
  •  768
    On Aristotle's Natural Limit
    History of Political Economy 46 (3): 387-407. 2014.
    Among scholars of ancient economic thought, it is widely recognized that Aristotle established an upper limit to money-making. This “natural limit” has been variously construed, with some claiming that it might be settled independently of Aristotle’s ethical theory. This paper defends the opposite thesis: Aristotle’s natural limit is inextricably tied to his account of human flourishing. It also argues that Aristotle precludes the wealth-seeking path as coincident with a flourishing life. Why? F…Read more
  •  442
    On the Historical Roots of Natural Capital in the Writings of Carl Linnaeus
    In Luca Fiorito, Scott Scheall & Carlos Eduardo Suprinyak (eds.), Research in the History of Economic Thought and Methodology, Emerald Publishing. pp. 103-117. 2018.